As the President said yesterday, the “Economy recovering but
hasn’t recovered.”

Why not?

Supply shocks.

Self-inflicted wounds as well (Congress debate over debt ceiling)

And some specific factors on why growth hasn't been faster...

3 segments of the economy are lagging:

State and local governments have been scaling
back. Recovery Act offset that. As the money
phased out, though, Congress did not follow through…

Residential construction. We built too
many houses during boom years. Now, we have roughly worked
off the excess. Still parts with overhang.
Nationwide, looks to me like we’re pretty close. Housing
construction normally cyclical… We’ve been recovering
without this engine.

Yahoo's Dan Gross asks about the 3.5% GDP point hit from all the
spending cuts and tax hikes on January 1st...

Sperling (paraphrase): Not going to challenge your premise [ie,
challenging it]. Our goal is to fight for middle
class. In budget deal, we all agreed on what we wanted to.
The enforcement mechanism was supposed to be equally odious for
both sides. Designed to have everyone want to work together on
real budget deal. No one wants to see those cuts go into
effect. Goal is to force compromise. That's the right way to
think about end of year. These could be action-forcing
events.

JASON FURMAN, Principal Deputy Director of the National
Economic Council

Here's the logic behind the Buffett Rule:

Average tax rate on high-income families was cut in half over
last 50 years.

Average family... tax rate went up.

So goal is to make millionaires stop paying lower rate than
middle class.

Senate will be voting on this when they return.

We get to our budget targets without the Buffett Rule. It's a
basic principle of tax fairness.

The $47 billion this raises is real money. And in
conjunction with other tax hikes, will be big money.

HEATHER ZICHAL, Deputy Assistant to the President For
Energy and Climate Change

No magic bullet.

No way to bring gas prices down to $2 overnight

We're doing the "all of the above" plan.

1) Oil. Quadrupled rigs, approved dozens of pipelines. Oil and
gas production up every year since Obama in office.

If state and local hiring had been normal, unemployment would be
1 point lower.

Strategic petroleum reserve...

No silver bullets for gas prices. Our production levels higher
than for 8 years. Using less foreign oil each year. Less than 50%
imports now. The big factors now are a million barrels a
day taken off market in dribs and drabs. Sudan, 100,000. Yemen,
100,000. None of these things atypical, but cumulatively, a
larger amount that's been taken off line. And then the risk
premium, possible conflict in Middle East. Because Europe's
economy is weak, we could grow without driving up prices. But
because of the others, can't.

"I don't engage in SPR release lightly."

Have to factor in many things... we're looking at it
closely. I will not be making any news today.

Budget

I signed biggest spending cut in long time.

Need to deal with both sides. Want to get revenue levels back to
those in the 20th Century... Then there's healthcare.

We spend $50 billion a year on healthcare for our troops.

Idea behind the Healthcare Act was to aim for savings.

The key to use to drive further improvements.

I have already indicated my willingness to engage in reforms...
as long as take care of people.

My hope is that post-election, there will be a serious
conversation in Congress about both sides... Revenue and
spending.

We have not seen a balanced approach from the other side.
We cannot just cut our way out of the problem.

Out of touch with personal finances of normal Americans?

Went to law school and college on scholarships. So did my wife.
We were still paying off student loans 9 years after graduated.
Bought first car for $900. Had big hole that allowed you to see
the road, so I knew my wife wasn't marrying me for my money. We
had credit-card debt we hadn't paid off. We had to start college
fund.

Our personal finances... not having to worry about bills or gas
prices... weren't stable until fairly recently. Middle
class upbringing and experience. In contrast to some of the
Republican candidates...